MOSCOW, January 20. /TASS/. Russian political decision-makers have overestimated Donald Trump’s ability and determination to mend bilateral relations, Russian expert Valery Garbuzov has told TASS, commenting on results of Trump’s first presidential year.

US President Donald Trump was sworn in on January 20, 2017.

"As far as expectations of the Russian political elite are concerned, disappointment will be the most accurate description," said Garbuzov, who heads the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of US and Canada Studies.

"Donald Trump’s rise to power in the US has created a sort of euphoria for the Russian political elite, which thought that nearly all problems in Russian-US relations are about to be solved. This euphoria has started to erode very quickly after Trump took office, but it took our political decision makers quite a while to sober up and take a more pragmatic look at the United States and Donald Trump."

He said that Russian offiicals mistakenly thought that the US president’s degree of domestic political authority, power and clout are comparable to that of his Russian counterpart.

"Our political elite has always thought that if the Russian president and the US president want to, they can solve all problems together," he said. "However, the US president’s powers are limited as compared to those of the Russian president.".